out parade or pretence, he spoke straight to the point. If any came expecting the turgid eloquence or the ribaldry of the frontier, they must have been startled at the earnest and sincere purity of his utterances. It was marvellous to see how this untutored man, by mere self-discipline and the chastening of his own spirit, had outgrown all meretricious arts, and found his way to the grandeur and strength of absolute simplicity.

"He spoke upon the theme which he had mastered so thoroughly. He demonstrated by copious historical proofs and masterly logic that the fathers who created. the Constitution in order to form a more perfect union, to establish justice, and to secure the blessings of liberty to themselves and their posterity, intended to empower the Federal government to exclude slavery from the Territories. In the kindliest spirit, he protested against the avowed threat of the Southern States to destroy the Union if, in order to secure freedom in those vast regions, out of which future States were to be carved, a Republican President were elected. He closed with an appeal to his audience, spoken with all the fire of his aroused and kindling conscience, with a full outpouring of his love of justice and liberty, to maintain their political purpose on that lofty and unassailable issue of right and wrong which alone could justify it, and not to be intimidated from their high resolve and sacred duty by any threats of destruction to the government or of ruin to themselves. He concluded with this telling sentence, which drove the whole argument home to all our hearts:

"Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith let us to the end dare to do our duty as we understand it.'

"That night the great hall, and the next day the whole city, rang with delighted applause and congratulations, and he who had come as a stranger departed with the laurels of a great triumph."

While in New York he visited the Five Points House

of Industry, and the following account of what occurred is given by a teacher there: "Our Sunday-School in the Five Points was assembled, one Sabbath morning, when I noticed a tall, remarkable man enter the room and take a seat among us. He listened with fixed attention to our exercises, and his countenance expressed such genuine interest that I approached him and suggested that he might be willing to say something to the children. He accepted the invitation with evident pleasure, and, coming forward, began a simple address which at once fascinated every little hearer and hushed the room into silence. His language was strikingly beautiful and his tones musical with the intensest feeling. The little faces around him would droop into sad conviction as he uttered the sentences of warning, and would brighten into sunshine as he spoke cheerful words of promise. Once or twice he attempted to close his remarks, but the imperative shouts of 'Go on!' 'Oh, do go on!' would compel him to resume. As I looked upon the gaunt and sinewy frame of the stranger and marked his powerful head and determined features, now touched into softness by the impressions of the moment, I felt an irresistible curiosity to learn something more about him, and when he was quietly leaving the room I begged to know his name. He courteously replied,"Abraham Lincoln, from Illinois.""

Lincoln received many invitations to speak in New England and delivered addresses in all of the prominent cities, where he created the same favorable impression and awakened the same popular enthusiasm.

After his inauguration as President, Lincoln made no formal speeches except his two inaugural addresses, but scarcely a week passed that he did not deliver some pleasant little speech from the balcony of the White House or at one of the military camps, and during his journey to Washington he was especially happy in his treatment of the serious questions which were troubling the public mind.

IV

A PRAIRIE POLITICIAN

WHEN Abraham Lincoln was twenty-two years old and a clerk in Denton Offutt's store he offered himself to the voters of New Salem and vicinity as a candidate for the Illinois Legislature. It was the year that the Whigs held their first National Convention and nominated Henry Clay as their candidate for President; and from that time, as has been seen, Lincoln made politics as well as law a profession, and participated actively in every campaign until he was elected President.

In those days nominations for office were made by announcement and not by conventions, and, according to custom, with thirteen other citizens fired with similar ambition, Lincoln issued a circular or "handbill," as it was familiarly called, setting forth in quaint and characteristic candor his "sentiments with regard to local affairs." It was his platform, and no utterance of his entire life is more interesting than the few personal remarks which he addressed to his neighbors:

"Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say, for one, that I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow-men by rendering myself worthy of their esteem. How far I shall succeed in gratifying this ambition is yet to be developed. I am young, and unknown to many of you. I was born, and have ever remained, in the most humble walks of life. I have no wealthy or popular relations or friends to recommend me. My case is thrown exclusively upon the independent voters of the county, and if elected they will have conferred a favor upon me for which I shall be unremitting in my labors.

to compensate. But if the good people in their wisdom shall see fit to keep me in the background, I have been too familiar with disappointments to be very much chagrined."

It was an audacious act for a young man who had been in the county only about nine months to aspire to the honor and responsibility of a law-maker, but, compared with his neighbors, Lincoln's qualifications were conspicuous. He could read and write, had a fair knowledge of literature, had read two or three lawbooks, was a practical surveyor, and by reason of his two journeys to New Orleans had seen a good deal more of the world than any one in that neighborhood. But these qualifications did not count for much in comparison with his ability as a public speaker and his faculty of doing things which had already made him a reputation throughout the county. Although his advantages had been limited, they were superior to those enjoyed by three-fourths of the young men in Sangamon County, and for education, experience, and other qualifications he surpassed a majority of the members of the Legislature. There were only a few men of culture and education in that body. It was chiefly made up of illiterate pioneers who mixed politics with farming and carried on their campaigns at camp-meetings, horseraces, country stores, and taverns, and resorted to every subterfuge that their shrewd minds could invent to secure votes. At the same time they were generally honest, patriotic, and earnest for the welfare of their constituents and their personal characters commanded the esteem and confidence of the public. Among such men Lincoln's talent for talking and writing, his knowledge of poetry and literature, and, more than all, his genius as a story-teller excited admiration and respect, and he was regarded as the most promising young man in the neighborhood. His announcement "handbill" discussed the several topics which at that time were being

agitated, such as the improvement of the Sangamon River. He related his experience with flat-boats, and declared that by straightening the channel and clearing away the drift-wood the stream could be made navigable. "The improvement of the Sangamon River," he sagely remarked, " is an object much better suited to our infant resources" than the construction of a railway, and, indeed, it was fifteen years later that the first whistle of a locomotive was heard in Illinois. He took broad grounds in favor of internal improvements, advocated a law prohibiting money-loaners from charging exorbitant rates of interest, and favored liberal appropriations for education.

"For my part," he said, "I desire to see the time when education, and by its means morality, sobriety, enterprise, and industry, shall become much more general than at present, and should be gratified to have it in my power to contribute something to the advancement of any measure which might have a tendency to accelerate that happy period."

Perhaps, if he could have made a thorough campaign and extended his acquaintance and popularity throughout the county, he might have been elected, but just a month after his announcement was published he went off to the Black Hawk War (as is told in Chapter VI.) and did not return until a few days before the election, so that his canvass was limited. It was long enough, however, for him to make a record as a man of moral courage and ability. Although the great majority of the population were Democrats, he boldly declared himself a Whig, which must have cost him many votes. National issues were not usually brought into local politics, but the contest between Clay and Jackson was animated and bitter; the Democrats were despotic and intolerant towards the opposition, and were so much in the majority that a Whig had very little consideration. Lincoln has left us a brief account of the campaign, in